


The Private Eye

by orphan_account



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Noir, BadassDetective!Reader, Detective Noir, Detectives, Expect smut, F/M, Film Noir, M/M, tags will be added as they apply
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-29
Updated: 2016-02-01
Packaged: 2018-05-03 21:38:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5307752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It doesn't quite make sense that a city chock-full of crime like Caper City only has one private detective. Things can get complicated. One evening, Steve Rogers steps into your office and hires you to investigate a strange burglar who seems impossible to find.<br/>You <i>need</i> to find an easier day job.</p><p>[Steve Rogers/Reader/Bucky Barnes, Detective Noir!AU]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

He sat across your desk and was leaning in towards you, big blue doe eyes and everything. He looked like he was on the verge of saying something, but caught himself the last minute.  
"I have some free time. I suppose I can take you on," you tell him. He releases a breath and looks all the more at ease. He settles back in his chair.  
"Start at the beginning, Mr. Rogers," you say, uncapping your pen and positioning it above a fresh white page in your notebook.  
"Last... last week was the first time that I noticed it. I don't know how long it's been actually going on for," Rogers pauses. "First, it was just a coffee mug that went missing. I thought I had just misplaced it, but then I started losing books, clothes, money. Anything that wasn't bolted to the ground was taken." His tone was increasingly worried, fitting for an increasingly worrying situation for an increasingly worrisome type of person. In a city like Caper, which hid its unrest behind a curtain of false reassurances and lying newspapers, someone like Mr. Rogers who revealed his unease was vulnerable. It was only a matter of time until he showed up to your office doorstep.  
(You could tell that he was probably new in town.)  
"Sometimes I see someone out of the corner of my eye," Rogers continues, "But I can never get a good enough look at him." You furrow your eyebrows and tap your pen against your desk.  
"Do you have any enemies, Mr. Rogers?"  
"Steve is okay. And no, I just moved in a month ago."  
(You're rather good at reading people.)  
"You'll find that some people build grudges quickly here." Steve is silent again. You hope that you didn't just intimidate the poor boy, although it didn't matter too much. There isn't anyone else who he could go to with this; you were the only one in the city who proudly sported the "Private Eye" badge. It would be great for business if it weren't for the fact that most people are too afraid to even speak about crime. In Caper, one has to learn to be very forgiving towards injustice.  
"Be wary of anyone who seems suspicious towards you. It really can be anyone," you warn. Steve nods. "And start cataloging what this person takes, it could give us hints as to his motive. May I come over tomorrow and inspect your apartment?"  
Steve nods again, stands, and you mirror him. He holds out his hand for you to shake and you accept it. You hand him a business card from a neat stack on your desk and smooth out your deep blue dress suit. You hope that your reputation of always looking damn good would precede you, if nothing else. You open the door of your dingy office and lead Steve down the stairs and out into the cold, empty street. None of the lanterns were lit.  
***  
After Steve's departure, you grab your brown coat off of the coat rack at the bottom of the stairs and step outside. You took good care to lock the door behind you. What help would you be to Steve if you ended up robbed, too?  
You live very conveniently, in a small apartment built right above your office. No one else shared the building with you, but it wasn't as lavish as seemed when you described it to people. It was wedged between a pharmacy and another apartment building, and it looked like the architect tried to make up for the lack of width in height. The frame was needlessly tall for an apartment, but then again, most buildings were in Caper. It was almost as if the city was trying to grab hold of the sky and pull itself out of hell.  
Although it was pitch black outside, you had walked these streets long enough to know your way around mechanically. The way your brown -- to match your coat -- boots drum against the cement normally gave you a sense of confidence, but tonight, their echoes made you feel alone. You enter the pharmacy next door.  
"Sorry, we're closed. You can come back tomorrow, we open again at eight!" A delicate but attention-grabbing voice calls from the maze of walls overflowing with colorful pill bottles.  
"It's just me, Emilia," you respond. All that's heard for a moment is shuffling, before a young woman with dark skin, long limbs, thin hair, and a crooked nose stumbles from the sea of medicine. Emilia walks poised with one hand fluttering along the rows of various bottles and the other in front of her.  
"You should say something next time, you know I can't see it's you." She stops once her hand brushes against the counter in front of her. You prop yourself on it with your elbows and pick at the chips in the varnish of the counter.  
"I will... you know, I got a new client today," you say. She raises her eyebrows.  
"What are they like?"  
"His name is Steve Rogers. He moved in recently, but this city's gonna take a toll on him soon enough if you ask me. He has broad shoulders and his voice was nice, you'd like him."  
"Hm. Maybe." Maybe Steve's jumpiness was rubbing off on you, but you could swear that your friend was more reserved than she usually was. You decide to ask.  
"Me? No, no, there's nothing wrong." Emilia smiles at you but it looks painted on, "Why don't you... Why don't you stay over tonight? I could use the company." You stay, and Emilia seems more relieved than she is glad.


	2. Chapter 2

“You said he climbed in through this window?” you tapped your pen against your notebook.

“Well, yeah. It’s the only broken one in the house. There’s no other way he could’ve gotten in, either, and two hundred dollars are missing from my drawer.”

You and Steve are clustered around an arrangement of shattered glass. You’re taking notes and he’s worrying over the notes you’re taking. There was no blood, nor were there any fingerprints left behind. This intruder was more clever than you had first thought. Not only that, but he was agile, too. The fire escape on this old building had rusted and collapsed beyond repair years ago, so he must have figured out his own way to climb up the side of the building with one hand and break the window with the other.

“You keep two hundred dollars just lying around in your house?” Steve’s cheeks shifted from pink to crimson and he doesn’t answer.

You turned away from the window and surveyed the room. It was rather plain, with white walls, a white bed, light wooden furniture, white carpet, and art painted exclusively with tints. It was much too bright for your taste, especially juxtaposed to the dark tones of your own home and office. If he had asked you for your opinion, you would’ve hired an interior designer immediately. But as it happened, he didn’t ask you what you thought nor could you afford a personal designer.

“Have you moved anything since you found the room like this?”

“I called you right away,” he told you and shook his head no. His voice then lowered, “You’re the only person who knows about this.”

You avoided responding, because this track felt like an overrun path that always runs to a meaningful conversation about trust, and you weren’t in the mood to open up to a client again.

“Mr. Rogers, if you could just step out for a moment while I take a look around.”

You pulled out a pair of new latex gloves from your purse and put them on. Steve watched your hands and looks ready to argue. He decided not to say anything and left with a look over his shoulder. It was obvious that he was still doubting his choice to involve you in this case but at that point you wouldn’t withdraw from your investigation, even if he asked you to. For his own good.

You circled around the room. What else was there to notice? The window was all that seemed out of place, everything else in the room appeared untouched. It was unlikely, of course, that your suspect broke in just to look around and leave, but with the undisturbed order of the room, there was no other conclusion that you could come to.

Until you looked into his bookshelf. On the second shelf, halfway down, there was a set of five identical books. Small, leather, and with faint cracks down their thin brown spines, all that let you tell them apart were the labels stuck on the center of the front cover. “Bucky -- 1932-33,″ the first one told you, and the second whispered, “Bucky -- 1934-35.” Down the line they went like that, until the 1940-41 book. It was gone and 1938-39 skipped straight to 1942-43.

But before you could go vocalize the questions brewing in your mind to Steve, a creak came from the window. You dropped the book and lifted your fists in front of your face out of instinct. There was a man, someone whom you had never seen before, and he was crouching on the wooden sill like a cat. His black costume looked heavy and he was completely shrouded in it, save for the top half of his face. He watched you with his blue eyes and you stared straight back. Instead of blinking, they narrowed.

Your heart was in your throat. He looked much stronger than you, without question, so you dropped your fists and put up your open hands in an attempt to appease him. You did have a gun tucked in your purse, but he didn’t have to know yet. That only seemed to annoy the man and he crept off of the sill without a sound. His approach was slow, dragged out, but confident and rose your dread to alarm. He wasn’t any less sure of himself when he plucked your purse from your grip with his left hand -- was that some kind of metal sleeve or a prosthetic? -- and used his right to push your head up.

His thumb dug into the soft skin below the bone of your chin and his stare shifted into a glower. His eyes flickered away to the door (like he didn’t even have to consider that you might try to hurt him, and he was right in that). He looked back at you and you knew that whatever he was trying to get across with his eyes, it was about Steve.

And then he was gone. Just as quickly as he came, he strolled back to the window and was just... gone. You followed him but there was no sight of the man, neither above nor below you. Damn.

“Steve!” you called out once your voice started working again, and it cracked at the end of his name, “Steve, get in here right now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> did I just make this a steve/reader/bucky fic???? is that a thing I'm doing now???? oops????


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